Nick Cassidy (Sam Worthington) walks into a room in the
Roosevelt
Hotel, has one last meal and then stands outside on the ledge of the
building.
His positioning catches the attention of the public and the media
below. In a
flashback we learn that Nick was once a cop, partnered with Mike
(Anthony
Mackie), but then also a prison escapee, claiming he was framed. He
manages to
escape while at the funeral of his father, much to the distress of his
brother
Joey (Jamie Bell). Back in the present and Nick asks for the police
negotiator
Lydia Spencer (Elizabeth Banks) so that he can gain further media
attention. She's
pressured for results by Jack (Edward Burns), a hardened cop.
Meanwhile, Joey
and his girlfriend Angie (Genesis Rodriguez) are staging an elaborate
heist in
a nearby building, attempting to steal a valuable rock from corrupt
businessman
David Englander (Ed Harris). It becomes increasingly clear that the
threads
between the two brothers are somehow related.

This disappointing thriller plummets quickly to its death
before
it can ever catch any air. What's missing here are threads of equal
weight and
importance. Director Asger Leth is fixated on what is essentially a
gimmicky
premise, and like its main character, it has nowhere to go. I couldn't
help but
recall the recent heist comedy Tower
Heist (2011) and its structure. Neither film is high art but Tower Heist at least saves its biggest
and most elaborate set pieces till last. The rest of the film is spent
developing
characters that have distinct personalities, a lot of self-awareness
and rather
plausible knowledge about their target.
Man on a Ledge is all of its title, save for an early flashback.
Everything
else happening around Nick simultaneously fails to engage. The heist in
the
nearby building is a series of tired stunts that we have been before in
much
better and more interesting films. There's even a laughably silly
cloaking
scene that echoes Mission Impossible:
Ghost Protocol (2011), only I don't think they were trying to be
funny.
Given how much time is spent on Joey and Angie, it feels ridiculously
anti-climatic. A lack of continuity also sours the tension in their
thread
because despite being tested by various high-tech security devices, in
the next
sequence they're comfortably in the office of their nemesis, waiting
for him.
The only time the film really thrills is early on when the camera first
makes
the transition onto Nick's ledge. It tracks through the window and then
out
onto the ledge in one movement. Its impacting because we feel the
separation
and the contrast of the two spaces: from the safety of the interior, to
what
could be a sudden free fall outside.

The realism of the early ledge scenes evaporates in
favour of
increasingly stupid behaviour and impossible stunts. My least favourite
moments
are shared between Nick swinging off the body of a rappelling SWAT
soldier and
also when Lydia decides that she'll come out onto the ledge too. Any
commentary
about the media below is watered down into mindless caricatures,
including a
story hungry reporter and the drones cheering for Nick. Dog
Day Afternoon (1975) this is not. I wondered if the scene where
people in the crowd are falling over each other to catch the money Nick
hurls
at them was Hollywood being self-reflective. No one in Hollywood at the
moment seems
more locked into gruff-mode than Sam Worthington. Aside from some
convincing trembling,
which may or may not have been acting, he fuels Nick with little more
than his
usual testosterone levels. All of his dialogue reads like taglines from
an era
of bygone Hollywood action stars. When asked whether he thinks about
hurting
himself in prison he says: "Hurt myself? No. Kill Myself? Every goddamn
day". I don't know why Ed Harris is in this film beyond a paycheck
because he's a far better actor than being forced to play Dr. Evil's
corporate
equivalent. Elizabeth Banks has the look of someone more suited to a
fashion
catalogue, rather than a burnout, repressed cop. Try not to laugh when
she attempts
to coax Nick off the ledge by offering to go to lunch with him. Acting
chops
are about the last Genesis Rodriguez from Entourage
will be remembered for. Her relationship with Jamie Bell is an
uninvolving one.
The implausibility of this film, whether it's the relationships, the
premise,
stunts or dialogue, makes it extremely hard to endure. Well before the
first
hour mark, that ledge was looking mighty tempting.